What car - Fun, Reliable, ~3k

[Slow]

Bmw e46 6 cylinder of some sort. Mne was a lowly 320ci which was still fast enough to overtake on our ste north scotland roads, made the A9 bareable for one

[caelite]

Ooft, my experience with older BMWs is that they are massive money pits. My friend has a 328I and my uncle runs a 530D and both cost a fortune to keep on the road, wouldnt touch one personally unless I had money to upkeep it properly.

[Slow]

Fair enough, mine was a £800 gumtree special. Did 8k miles in 3-4 months before the high oil consumption (not normal, had a blocked pcv valve or something) got the better of me so I broke it for parts and got back £810. Still got a driving car to have fun with in my mums field.

Also a student during this time so sorta relevant.

[mark.c]

caelite said:

Ooft, my experience with older BMWs is that they are massive money pits. My friend has a 328I and my uncle runs a 530D and both cost a fortune to keep on the road, wouldnt touch one personally unless I had money to upkeep it properly.

That's a shame, all cars can do that but if you buy right in my experience of running BMW's both old and older for over twenty years is that they stack up very well against the competition.

[caelite]

mark.c said:

That's a shame, all cars can do that but if you buy right in my experience of running BMW's both old and older for over twenty years is that they stack up very well against the competition.

Its not so much the reliability and more the price of parts, My uncles was killed by a gearbox failure with the replacement costing somewhere to the tune of £2k. My friends isnt the best example (15 year old, 100+k miles) but it just seems like he has CONSTANT issues with electronics, patches of rust and it seams to eat consumables (rear tyres, oil, petrol etc etc)

[Lester H]

LankyLegoHead said:

I'll throw another vote in for the MK1 Octavia VRS. Mine served me quite well, and was pretty reliable. It's a well known chassis/engine so plenty of parts out there to fix them and/or make them go faster! Was a lot of fun to drive too, dispite the reputation the MK4 chassis has.

DSC_0835 by Jason.Easton, on Flickr

Failing that, a Renaultsport Clio would be a fair bit more fun.

Must agree on the "hot" Skoda front. son had Mk.2'., ordinary spec but our mechanic at MOT time said "these are good news" . BMWs lovely, but - sorry for the cliche- if it was expensive to run new, it'll be expensive to run old.

[HJMS123]

van cleef said:

I had a 55 plate 225 for 7 years without that much problems bar wear and tear.

If you can haggle this would be my choice.

http://www.pistonheads.com/classifieds/used-cars/r...

That's very very cheap, good ones tend to go for almost double that.

[Bradley1500]

TameRacingDriver said:

I had 2 Clios (172 and 182), not cars to run on a budget despite what people say on here, they are made of chocolate and cheese. Your hand will always be dipping into your pocket on little repairs here and there which will add up.

Something Japanese is far more robust.

If you can live with 2-seats which you aren't sure about an MR2 would be worth a shout.

Otherwise, Civic Type-R would be better than a Clio for me. Much better made and a far better engine and box.

Second all of this.

Clio Sport's seem to be hit and miss, there's stories of faultless reliability but equally as many horror stories. Friend's of mine who've owned them have loved them but they needed a lot of up keep. Plus the driving position is crap if you're tall.

Japanese cars are generally far more reliable, Civic Type R as already recommended. I absolutely loved mine and your budget would easily get a good one.

If you can stretch your budget a little check out Integra Type R's, they're going up in value so if you buy right and hold onto it you may even make some money.

I know you've ruled out BMW's, but my E36 328 has been brilliantly reliable and friends with E36's have always found them reliable. Mine's on 156,000 miles now but still runs perfectly.

[caelite]

Bradley1500 said:

Second all of this.

Clio Sport's seem to be hit and miss, there's stories of faultless reliability but equally as many horror stories. Friend's of mine who've owned them have loved them but they needed a lot of up keep. Plus the driving position is crap if you're tall.

Japanese cars are generally far more reliable, Civic Type R as already recommended. I absolutely loved mine and your budget would easily get a good one.

If you can stretch your budget a little check out Integra Type R's, they're going up in value so if you buy right and hold onto it you may even make some money.

I know you've ruled out BMW's, but my E36 328 has been brilliantly reliable and friends with E36's have always found them reliable. Mine's on 156,000 miles now but still runs perfectly.

Aye im shelfing that Fiesta ST, aparently that dealers definition of FSH was "Oh aye its been service right up to 40k then NO receipts for the 35k miles after that". Looked in alright nick but I hate giving people like that my money purely out of spite.

Out of curiosity how many miles are Civic T-Rs good for usually? There is a few of them nearby <3k but they are all getting a bit north of 100k, I wouldve though a high revving engine might suffer a bit at high miles but Id happily be proven wrong.

[Bradley1500]

caelite said:

Aye im shelfing that Fiesta ST, aparently that dealers definition of FSH was "Oh aye its been service right up to 40k then NO receipts for the 35k miles after that". Looked in alright nick but I hate giving people like that my money purely out of spite.

Out of curiosity how many miles are Civic T-Rs good for usually? There is a few of them nearby <3k but they are all getting a bit north of 100k, I wouldve though a high revving engine might suffer a bit at high miles but Id happily be proven wrong.

With your budget you'll find a lower mileage example, although you may have to travel because of your location, but they're good for higher mileages. Mine was just over 100K when I sold it and still running fine. I gave it death regularly too. A friend of mine has recently sold his EP3 which had over 170K on it, it had started smoking a little when VTEC engaged but still ran fine.

[PorkRind]

Another for the 172 club.. Mine had 212k on it by the time I got rid of it.. the only expensive thing is the belt service at around 800..

[CubanPete]

I don't think you can go to far wrong with an mx5. They are a giggle. Should get a minter or a scrape into forced induction one for this money.

Early BMW minis have always been rated as a good drive.

Suzuki swift sport, not sure what you can get for the money

A BMW (as an owner) are more GT than back road blaster, and be wary as there is the potential for big bills. Though you can by a lot of car for a grand...

Vag stuff isn't great for handling in my experience.

Focus st or other 2 litre variant

[ZX10R NIN]

If you don't mind a bit more of a GT then look at CLK.

http://www4.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201...

Focus ST
http://www4.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201...

207 GTI (basically Mini running gear)
http://www4.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201...

Just over budget but these are reliable

Alfa Mito
http://www4.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201...